Not Something Ready Made
by Snows Of Yester-Year
Summary: Lin is starting to suspect that there's more going on between her mother and Sokka than meets the eye. Tokka.


"And then, just when the dam was about to blow, I fought my way past the herd of wild hogmonkeys guarding the town, battled the army that surrounded it, and finally -"

"Sokka."

"- got through the front gates, where I found the king the Fire Nation appointed and -"

"_Sokka."_

He paused, staring at her blankly. "What?"

"I've heard this story a dozen times already," Lin deadpanned.

"I must have heard it a _hundred _times," Toph complained to her right from where she was laying on the floor, legs crossed and arms pillowing her head.

Sokka shot her a glare. "Lin asked how we met," he said petulantly to Toph, "so that's what I'm telling her!"

"Yeah, how _we _met, Snoozles," Toph said flatly, "not an account of every single thing you did in the war prior to that!" She paused, stretching. "Also, I wasn't even _there _and I know that's not how it happened."

"Oh, yeah?" he challenged, crossing his arms. "Well, if _you _know so much, why don't _you _tell her how it went?"

"You walked into the town and promptly got detained by Fire Nation soldiers," she smirked, eliciting a giggle from her daughter. "The only reason they believed you about Jet blowing up the dam is because of that old man who you helped."

"Ah, you're no fun," Sokka muttered, leaning heavily on one hand.

Toph laughed, pushing herself upright. "That's a lie."

"I still liked your story, Sokka," Lin said with a broad grin.

He gave her a winning smile. "Thank you, Lin."

"Quit it with the flattery, kid," Toph said, reaching out her hand to help Lin up. "It's time for you to go to bed anyway."

Lin visibly wilted. "Aw, do I have to?"

"I'll take her," Sokka offered.

"She's ten years old, she doesn't need someone to put her to bed."

"I'll tell her one last story," Sokka said, shooting Lin a small smile and a wink. "Come on Toph, what do you say?"

"Please, Mom?" Lin begged, clasping one of her mother's hands with both of hers.

Toph scowled for a long moment before heaving a sigh, waving her hand at them. "Fine, go on."

"Yes!" Lin crowed, scampering off to her bedroom. "Goodnight, Mom!"

"Go to sleep after Sokka is done!" Toph yelled after her. "To _sleep! _No staying up Metalbending, and may the Spirits help you if I catch you sending messages to Tenzin via lemur again in the middle of the night!"

Lin scowled over her shoulder at her mother, but Sokka was laughing. He caught up to Lin, placing a gentle hand on her back and guiding her towards her bedroom. "Your mom's a bit of a handful, isn't she?"

"_I heard that!"_

He laughed again as they entered Lin's room, shutting the door behind him but leaving it ajar. Lin was already in her sleepwear, so she scrambled directly into bed, sitting back against her pillows as Sokka sat at the foot of her bed.

"So," he said, "do you want to hear how your Mom and I met?"

"For real this time," Lin said flippantly, crossing her arms and burrowing herself deeper into the blankets.

"Of course," he grinned. "It's an incredible story.

"We went to Gaoling in search of an Earthbending teacher for Uncle Aang. We tried going to one of the schools in town, but it, ah, didn't really work out. When we were leaving, he heard some kids talking about this Earth Rumble thing. He thought it sounded promising, so he asked them where it was, and they told him it was on the Island of _Nunya _-"

"Nun'ya _business_," Lin finished triumphantly, grinning.

"Yup!" he laughed. "So Aunt Katara did what all good girlfriends do."

"What's that?"

"She gave Aang a hug and froze the boys to a wall so they would tell her where it was."

Lin already knew this, but it still made her giggle and feel a spark of pride for her aunt.

"So we went to the Earth Rumble-"

"Was it like Pro-Bending?"

"No, not quite," he said. "It had a lot less rules than Pro-Bending does. You didn't have to just use discs of earth. The entire _platform _was made of earth, and you could more or less do whatever you wanted with it, and you could get your opponents out of the ring however you felt was necessary. And they weren't all that bothered with headshots."

"That sounds so much more exciting!" she sulked. "Why isn't Pro-Bending more like that?"

"Because Uncle Aang is boring and didn't want people to get compound fractures."

She huffed, crossing her arms.

"So we started watching," he continued. "And this one Earthbender, The Boulder, man, he was tearing it up! Beat every single opponent who tried to face him, except -"

"Except my mother."

"Except your mother," he grinned. "She knocked him out of the ring so fast he didn't know what hit him. It was amazing! She shot this stream of earth underground that caught his foot and knocked him off balance, and then she made a pillar of earth shoot him out of the ring. Absolutely incredible!"

Lin couldn't keep the proud smile off her face.

"So Aang went up to try to talk to her, but, you know, she didn't want to talk, she wanted to fight! So she Earthbended at him, but he used Airbending to stop the attack which wound up knocking her out of the ring, so it looked like he won."

"Cheater."

"He wasn't doing it on purpose," Sokka assured her. "Either way, your mom was not amused. We figured out where she lived and went there to see her, only to find out that your grandparents had no idea how great an Earthbender she was. They still had her at the beginners level in her official training."

"Because she's blind?" Lin asked, even though she already knew the answer.

"Yes," he confirmed. "They didn't realize her Earthbending let her see, although even if they did, they probably wouldn't have let her do more advanced Earthbending anyway. See, the guy who ran Earth Rumble thought that your mom and Aang cheated him with how Aang won, so he captured them for ransom. Aunt Katara and I went to the arena with your grandfather and the Earthbender he hired to teach your mother to get them back."

"How'd you do it?" she asked in a hushed voice, hugging her knees to her chest.

"They paid the ransom and Toph was released, but they were planning on selling Aang to the Fire Lord. So your mom faced them - all of them! Not only the Earthbender who owned the arena, but all of the other ones who fought in Earth Rumble as well. And she took them all out! It was incredible!"

Normally, Sokka would launch into a description of how Toph Earthbended all of them into submission, but he took a hard look at Lin and saw how her shoulders slumped and her eyes drooped. A knowing grin crossed his face.

"I'm not tired," she insisted blearily, seeing the look he was giving her.

"Of course not," he said.

"So then what happened?"

"Your mom ran away to teach Aang Earthbending and fight the war with us," he said with an affectionate smile. "And she's been with us ever since." He stood, crossing over to press a kiss against her hair. "Goodnight, Lin."

She didn't have the energy to protest, murmuring goodnight in return as he switched off the light and left her bedroom. The last thing she saw before she drifted off was her bedroom door opening to reveal her mother leaning against the wall, a small smile on her face.

She woke up a couple of hours later, confused and very thirsty. Rubbing her eyes, she pushed back the covers and stumbled to her feet, opening the door and wandering out into the hallway. She was very surprised to hear voices coming from the living room.

"And then we scammed that one old rich guy together, remember?" her mother was saying. "I pretended that he hit me with his carriage -"

"And I pretended to be an officer so he would bribe me into silence," Sokka finished, laughing. "Oh, man, that was a clever one."

"I certainly thought so."

Lin hesitantly crept down the hallway to peer around the corner at them. They were sitting together on the couch in a small pool of lamplight, Sokka sitting upright with Toph sprawled across the sofa with her head in his lap, her feet crossed and propped up on the armrest, far away from the ground. She had pulled her hair out of her usual practical style, and Sokka was quietly running one hand through it, a distant smile on his face. Lin glanced at the clock and resisted the urge to gasp. It was one in the morning! Why was Sokka still here?

"Any particular reason you're up, short stuff?" her mom asked, making Lin and Sokka jump in unison. Sokka glanced up at her, surprise written on his face, quickly pulling his hand out of Toph's hair and smoothing his own wolftail nervously.

"I-I was thirsty," she said.

"So you came to the living room?" Toph challenged.

"Just because I heard voices," she said defensively. "I wasn't trying to - to eavesdrop or anything, Mom, honest!"

"All right, all right, I believe you," Toph said, waving one hand at her lightly. "Get your drink and go back to sleep, kiddo. I'll be going to bed shortly."

"Okay," she said, bobbing her head in a quick, nervous nod. "Um. Goodnight, Mom. Goodnight, Sokka."

"Goodnight, Lin."

"Sleep tight, kid."

She got some water and wandered back to her bedroom, but as tired as she was, she couldn't for the life of her fall back asleep.


End file.
